An analysis of domestic water management performance across regions in Taiwan

This study presents an indicator to measure the performance of domestic water management that focuses on raw water consumption and sewage treatment by using the data envelopment analysis (DEA) technique. The data are extracted from twenty-two counties/cities in Taiwan covering the period of 2009-2011, and eventually sixty-six observations are obtained. We compare the management performance between urban and rural regions and examine the factor that affects the performance variation by using the Tobit regression. The results find that a spatial inequality exists across urban regions and rural regions. The analysis results derived from the Tobit model find that the extent rate of sewerage systems, the volunteer participation rate and the education level play significant roles in affecting management performance. An increase in each per cent of the extent rate of sewerage systems, public participation and high-level educated citizens may lead to an increase of management performance by 0.37339%, 0.9543% and 0.9756%, respectively.